Dec 05, 2014

The French know something about wine …. and apparently about how to open wine bottles too. No corkscrews needed. Just a shoe and a few delicate taps. For more culinary secrets, check out How to Peel a Head of Garlic in Less Than 10 Seconds, and How to Separate an Egg Yolk with a Plastic Bottle. H/T @coudal.

Nov 27, 2014

NASA Commentator Pat Ryan talks with International Space Station Food System Manager Vickie Kloeris about the types of food that are prepared for crews on orbit and the selections available for the Expedition 42 Thanksgiving celebration.

"When I left the control room, everybody was moved, was excited, most of the people were crying. People are more, yeah, they have difficulties to believe that it happened, so, but we are very busy, the control team is busy in checking the situation, stabilising the situation, so they won't have much time to think of the historical moment - they have to work," head of ESA operations Paolo Ferri told journalists after the landing."Signs continue coming, of course the scientific experiments will start a bit later, but the measurements for the instruments which were already active - and they are already active now - are coming," Mr Ferri added.

Apr 04, 2013

English composerGustav Holst composed The Planets between 1914 and 1916. The Birmingham premiere of the suite took place in 1918, fifteen years before Pluto was discovered. Though the Planets became by far the most popular work of Holst's and one of the most known pieces by an English-born composer, Holst did not consider the piece one of his finest. Partially because of this, he never wrote an eighth movement, though unexpectedly the IAU relegated Pluto from its status as planet proper in 2006.